THE ZUGSPITZE PAINTED BY CARL ROTTMANN

CARL ROTTMANN (1797-1850)  

 Die Zugspitze  (2, 962 m- 9, 718 ft) 

Germany 

In View of the Eibsee, 1825, oil on canvas,  Neue Pinakothek, Munchen

The mountain 
The Zugspitze (2,962m -9,718 ft) above sea level, is the highest peak of the Wetterstein Mountains as well as the highest mountain in Germany. It lies south of the town of Garmisch-Partenkirchen, and the border between Germany and Austria runs over its western summit. South of the mountain is the Zugspitzplatt, a high karst plateau with numerous caves. On the flanks of the Zugspitze are three glaciers, including the two largest in Germany: the Northern Schneeferner with an area of 30.7 hectares and the Höllentalferner with an area of 24.7 hectares. The third is the Southern Schneeferner which covers 8.4 hectares.
The Zugspitze was first climbed on 27 August 1820 by Josef Naus, his survey assistant, Maier, and mountain guide, Johann Georg Tauschl. Today there are three normal routes to the summit: one from the Höllental valley to the northeast; another out of the Reintal valley to the southeast; and the third from the west over the Austrian Cirque (Österreichische Schneekar). One of the best known ridge routes in the Eastern Alps runs along the knife-edged Jubilee Ridge (Jubiläumsgrat) to the summit, linking the Zugspitze, the Hochblassen and the Alpspitze. For mountaineers there is plenty of nearby accommodation. On the western summit of the Zugspitze itself is the Münchner Haus and on the western slopes is the Wiener-Neustädter Hut.
Three cable cars run to the top of the Zugspitze. The first, the Tyrolean Zugspitze Cable Car, was built in 1926 and terminated on an arête below the summit before the terminus was moved to the actual summit in 1991. A rack railway, the Bavarian Zugspitze Railway, runs inside the northern flank of the mountain and ends on the Zugspitzplatt, from where a second cable car takes passengers to the top. The rack railway and the Eibsee Cable Car, the third cableway, transport an average of 500,000 people to the summit each year. In winter, nine ski lifts cover the ski area on the Zugspitzplatt. The weather station, opened in 1900, and the research station in the Schneefernerhaus are mainly used to conduct climate research.
At the Zugspitze's summit is the Münchner Haus, a mountain hut (Alpenhütte), a facility built by the German Alpine Club (Deutscher Alpenverein). For more than a hundred years, the summit has also had a weather station, which nowadays also gathers data for the Global Atmosphere Watch.
Climbing up the Zugspitze can involve several routes. The large difference in elevation between Garmisch-Partenkirchen and the summit is 2,200 m (7,200 ft), making the climb a challenge even for trained mountaineers.

The painter 
Carl Anton Joseph Rottmann was a German landscape painter and the most famous member of the Rottmann family of painters. Rottmann belonged to the circle of artists around the Ludwig I of Bavaria, who commissioned large landscape paintings exclusively from him. He is best known for mythical and heroising landscapes. The landscape painter Karl Lindemann-Frommel belonged to his school. Rottmann  received his first drawing lessons from his father, Friedrich Rottmann, who taught drawing at the university in Heidelberg. He formed himself chiefly through the study of nature and of great masterworks. In his first artistic period, he painted atmospheric phenomena. After gaining prominence with Heidelberg at Sunset (a water color), and Castle Eltz, he settled in Munich in 1822 and devoted himself to Bavarian scenery. Here his second period began, and in 1824 he married Friedericke, the daughter of his uncle, Friedrich Ludwig von Sckell, who served as an attendant at court. Through this connection, he made the acquaintance of King Ludwig I of Bavaria, who in 1826/27 sponsored his travels in Italy in order to widen his repertoire, which up to that point consisted solely of domestic, German, landscapes. In Italy, Rottmann made sketches for the 28 Italian landscapes in fresco which he was commissioned to paint in the arcades of the Hofgarten at Munich. The cycle, completed in 1833, gave visual expression to Ludwig’s alliance with Italy, and raised the genre of landscape painting to the height of history painting, the preferred mode of the King’s other great commissions for monumental painting. The frescos unfortunately deteriorated under climatic influences. The cartoons for them are in the Darmstadt Gallery.
In 1834 Rottmann traveled to Greece to prepare for a commission from Ludwig for a second cycle; one might mark here the beginning of his third period. At first also intended for the Hofgarten arcade, the 23 great landscapes were eventually installed in the newly built Neue Pinakothek where they were given their own hall.

ALPSPITZE BY WASSILY KANDINSKY

WASSILY KANDINSKY  (1866-1944)

"Der Blue Berge" - Alpspitze (2,628 m - 8,622ft)

Germany (Bavaria)

 1. In Der Blaue Berge (The Blue Mountain). 1908/09, oil on canvas,
The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York

The mountain 

The Alpspitze (2,628 m - 8,622ft) is a mountain in Bavaria, Germany. Its pyramidal peak is the symbol of Garmisch-Partenkirchen and is one of the best known and most attractive mountains of the Northern Limestone Alps. It is made predominantly of Wetterstein limestone from the Upper Triassic.
Several klettersteigs run up the Alpspitze. The shortest ascent starts at the valley station of Osterfelderkopf (2,033 m) on the Alpspitze Cable Car from Garmisch-Partenkirchen. From the Osterfelderkopf the Alpspitze may be climbed either directly along the Alpspitz-Ferrata, an easy, mostly protected and much frequented klettersteig (ca. 2 hours from the Osterfelderkopf) or the summit may be reached on the North Face Climb (Nordwandsteig), which runs in a curve to the east into the Oberkar cirque and from there along the left-hand edge of the cirque to the top.
Another ascent runs from the col of Grießkarscharte (2,460 m), which is reached either from the Höllentalanger Hut in the Höllental valley via the cirque of Mathaisenkar (involving a klettersteig) or from the lake of Stuibensee via the Grießkar cirque.
The popular route from the Alpspitze via the arete of Jubiläumsgrat to the Zugspitze is a long and difficult climbing tour, which involves UIAA grade III sections.
Why should Der Blaue Berge by Kandinsky should represent the Alpspitze in Garmisch-Partenkirchen ? No one could certify it of course, but there are strong presumptions for it...  The triangular shape, characteristic of this Bavarian summit, is exactly reflected in Kandinsky's work. There is also the fact that this painting was made at the time Kandinsky was living in Bavaria, very close to this peak... But these are only hypotheses

The painter 

Wassily Wassilyevich Kandinsky (Васи́лий Васи́льевич Канди́нский) was a Russian-French  painter and art theorist.  He is credited with painting one of the first recognised purely abstract works. Born in Moscow, Kandinsky spent his childhood in Odessa, where he graduated at Grekov Odessa Art school. He enrolled at the University of Moscow, studying law and economics. Successful in his profession—he was offered a professorship (chair of Roman Law) at the University of Dorpat—Kandinsky began painting studies (life-drawing, sketching and anatomy) at the age of 30.
In 1896, Kandinsky settled in Munich, studying first at Anton Ažbe's private school and then at the Academy of Fine Arts.
From 1906 to 1908 Kandinsky spent a great deal of time travelling across Europe (he was an associate of the Blue Rose symbolist group of Moscow), until he settled in the small Bavarian town of Murnau. In 1908 he bought a copy of Thought-Forms by Annie Besant and Charles Webster Leadbeater. In 1909 he joined the Theosophical Society.
The Blue Mountain (1908–1909) was painted at this time, demonstrating his trend toward abstraction. A mountain of blue is flanked by two broad trees, one yellow and one red. A procession, with three riders symbolizing his crusade against conventional aesthetic values and his dream of a better, more spiritual future through the transformative powers of art. The faces, clothing, and saddles of the riders are each a single colour, and neither they nor the walking figures display any real detail. The flat planes and the contours also are indicative of Fauvist influence. The broad use of colour in The Blue Mountain illustrates Kandinsky's inclination toward an art in which colour is presented independently of form, and which each colour is given equal attention. The composition is more planar; the painting is divided into four sections: the sky, the red tree, the yellow tree and the blue mountain with the three riders.

After the outbreak of World War I, Kandinsky left Germany for Moscow.  He was unsympathetic to the official theories on art in Communist Russia, and he soon returned to Germany in 1920, a few years after the Revolution. There, he taught at the Bauhaus school of art and architecture from 1922 until the Nazis closed it in 1933. He then moved to France, where he lived for the rest of his life, becoming a French citizen in 1939 and producing some of his most prominent art. He died at Neuilly-sur-Seine in 1944.

DIE LORELEI BY NIKOLAÏ ASTUDIN

NIKOLAÏ ASTUDIN (1847-1925) 

Die Loreley (132m - 433ft)

Germany 

Engraving from an oil on canvas, 1910

The mountain 

Die Loreley  (132m- 433 ft) high  is a slate cliff in the Upper Middle Rhine Valley World Heritage near the town of St. Goarshausen. The view of St. Goarshausen, from the Loreley outlook point, with Castle Katz and the view of the town St. Goar and its Fortress Rheinfels, leaves a wonderful impression on all Loreley tourists. The Rhine, at the Loreley, is up to 82 feet deep and only 371 feet wide. Because this area is so deep and narrow, it is one of the most dangerous places in the World Heritage Upper Middle Rhine Valley. Ships, crossing each other here and all along the section between Oberwesel and St. Goarshausen, are directed by light signals, called “Wahrschau”.
The name comes from the old German words lureln, Rhine dialect for "murmuring", and the Celtic term ley ("rock"). The translation of the name would therefore be: "murmur rock" or "murmuring rock". The heavy currents, and a small waterfall in the area (still visible in the early 19th century) created a murmuring sound, and this combined with the special echo the rock produces to act as a sort of amplifier, giving the rock its name. The murmuring is hard to hear today owing to the urbanization of the area. Other theories attribute the name to the many accidents, by combining the German verb "lauern" (to lurk, lie in wait) with the same "ley" ending, with the translation "lurking rock".
In the German language orthographic reform of 1903, in almost all German terms the letter "y" was changed to the letter "i".
The rock and the murmur it creates have inspired various tales. An old legend envisioned dwarfs living in caves in the rock. The Lorelei have inspired as well quite a lot of artists, musicians and painters and poets, the most famous of them being Heinrich Heine (link  to the full poem here)

 The painter 

Nikolai Lvovoch Astudin ( Николай Львович Астудин)  was a Russian landscape painter.

Astudin was the son of an officer and completed his school education in Saint Petersburg. He then became a student of the landscape painter Armand-Théophile Cassagne (1823-1907) in Paris. Study trips lead him to Finland, to the Alpine countries and to Italy. As early as 1876 and 1877 Astudin had exhibitions in Berlin,  and in 1885 in Zurich.  Among his Bonner motifs are the Rhine Bridge (1898) and the Godesburg. In 1912, he moved to Oberlahnstein, where he lived until his death. In this late phase, he mainly painted the Rhine motifs and repeatedly painted Lahneck Castle and The Lorelei (above).  Astudin was widely known for his Rhine paintings and the numerous reproductions of his Rhine views. His work is an expression of the Rhine and Eifelromantik of the early 20th century.

_______________________________
2017 - Wandering Vertexes...
by Francis Rousseau 

THE WATZMANN BY ADRIAN LUDWIG RICHTER

ADRIAN LUDWIG RICHTER (1803-1884) 

The Watzmann  (2,713m - 8,901ft) 

Germany (Bavarian Alps)

In The Watzmann,1826, oil on canvas, Neue Pinalothek, Munchen 

The mountain 
The Watzmann (2,713m - 8,901ft) is a mountain in the Bavarian Alps south of the village of Berchtesgaden. It is the third highest in Germany, and the highest located entirely on German territory. Three main peaks array on a N-S axis along a ridge on the mountain's taller western half: Hocheck (2,651 m), Mittelspitze (Middle Peak, 2,713 m) and Sьdspitze (South Peak, 2,712 m).
The Watzmann massif also includes the 2,307 m Watzmannfrau (Watzmann Wife, also known as Kleiner Watzmann or Small Watzmann), and the Watzmannkinder (Watzmann Children), five lower peaks in the recess between the main peaks and the Watzmannfrau.
The entire massif lies inside Berchtesgaden National Park.
The Watzmann Glacier is located below the famous east face of the Watzmann in the Watzmann cirque and is surrounded by the Watzmanngrat arête, the Watzmannkindern and the Kleiner Watzmann. The size of the glacier reduced from around 30 hectares (74 acres) in 1820 until it split into a few fields of firn, but between 1965 and 1980 it advanced significantly again and now has an area of 10.1 hectares (25 acres). Above and to the west of the icefield lie the remains of a transport-bomber that crashed in October 1940.
Amongst the other permanent snow and icefields the Eiskapelle ("Ice Chapel") is the best known due to its easy accessibility from St. Bartholomä. The Eiskapelle may well be the lowest lying permanent snowfield in the Alps. Its lower end is only 930 metres high in the upper Eisbach valley and is about an hour's walk from St. Bartholomä on the Königssee. The Eiskapelle is fed by mighty avalanches that slide down from the east face of the Watzmann in spring and accumulate in the angle of the rock face. Sometimes a gate-shaped vault forms in the ice at the point where the Eisbach emerges from the Eiskapelle. Before entering there is an urgent warning sign that others have been killed by falling ice.
In the east face itself is another icefield in the so-called Schöllhorn cirque, called the Schöllhorneis, which is crossed by the Kederbach Way (Kederbacher-Weg). The cirque and icefield are named after the Munich citizen, Christian Schöllhorn, who was the first victim on the east face. On 26 May 1890 he fell at the upper end of the icefield into the randkluft and was fatally injured. Another small nameless snowfield is located several hundred metres below the Mittelspitze also in the east face.

The painter 

Adrian Ludwig Richter was a German painter and etcher, born at Dresden, the son of the engraver Karl August Richter, from whom he received his training;  but he was strongly influenced by Erhard and Chodowiecki. He was the most popular, and in many ways the most typical German illustrator of the middle of the 19th century. His work is as typically German and homely as are the fairy-tales of Grimm. Richter visited Italy from 1823–1826, and his Thunderstorm in the Sabine Mountains at the Staedel Museum in Frankfurt is one of the rare Italian subjects from his brush. In 1828 he worked as designer for the Meissen factory, and in 1841 he became professor and head of the landscape atelier at the Dresden Academy.  As a painter Richter aimed at a thorough blending of the figure element with the landscape and may be judged by the following examples: "Harvest Procession in the Campagna" (1833) and three others in the Leipzig Museum: "Ferry at the Schreckenstein" (1836) and "Bridal Procession in Springtime" (1847), in the Dresden Gallery; "View of the Riesengebirge" (1839), in the National Gallery, Berlin. One of his most notable protégés was Hermann Lungkwitz.

Among his 240 etchings are about 140 views in Saxony, others of Salzburg, Rome, and the Campagna. His individuality is most completely revealed in his 3000 or more drawings.  An eye disease put a stop to the practice of his art in 1874; he was pensioned in 1877, and died at Loschwitz, near Dresden.

THE WATZMANN PAINTED BY CASPAR DAVID FRIEDRICH

CASPAR DAVID FRIEDRICH (1774-1840)  

Watzmann (2,713m - 8,901ft) 

Germany

 In  The Watzmann, oil on canvas 1824-25 , Berlin State Museum 

The mountain 

The Watzmann (2,713m - 8,901ft) is a mountain in the Bavarian Alps south of the village of Berchtesgaden. It is the third highest in Germany, and the highest located entirely on German territory. Three main peaks array on a N-S axis along a ridge on the mountain's taller western half: Hocheck (2,651 m), Mittelspitze (Middle Peak, 2,713 m) and Sьdspitze (South Peak, 2,712 m).

The Watzmann massif also includes the 2,307 m Watzmannfrau (Watzmann Wife, also known as Kleiner Watzmann or Small Watzmann), and the Watzmannkinder (Watzmann Children), five lower peaks in the recess between the main peaks and the Watzmannfrau.

The entire massif lies inside Berchtesgaden National Park.

The Watzmann Glacier is located below the famous east face of the Watzmann in the Watzmann cirque and is surrounded by the Watzmanngrat arête, the Watzmannkindern and the Kleiner Watzmann. The size of the glacier reduced from around 30 hectares (74 acres) in 1820 until it split into a few fields of firn, but between 1965 and 1980 it advanced significantly again and now has an area of 10.1 hectares (25 acres). Above and to the west of the icefield lie the remains of a transport-bomber that crashed in October 1940.

Amongst the other permanent snow and icefields the Eiskapelle ("Ice Chapel") is the best known due to its easy accessibility from St. Bartholomä. The Eiskapelle may well be the lowest lying permanent snowfield in the Alps. Its lower end is only 930 metres high in the upper Eisbach valley and is about an hour's walk from St. Bartholomä on the Königssee. The Eiskapelle is fed by mighty avalanches that slide down from the east face of the Watzmann in spring and accumulate in the angle of the rock face. Sometimes a gate-shaped vault forms in the ice at the point where the Eisbach emerges from the Eiskapelle. Before entering there is an urgent warning sign that others have been killed by falling ice.

In the east face itself is another icefield in the so-called Schöllhorn cirque, called the Schöllhorneis, which is crossed by the Kederbach Way (Kederbacher-Weg). The cirque and icefield are named after the Munich citizen, Christian Schöllhorn, who was the first victim on the east face. On 26 May 1890 he fell at the upper end of the icefield into the randkluft and was fatally injured. Another small nameless snowfield is located several hundred metres below the Mittelspitze also in the east face.

The painter 

Caspar David Friedrich was a 19th-century German Romantic landscape painter, considered as the most important German artist of his generation. He is best known for his mid-period allegorical landscapes which typically feature contemplative figures silhouetted against night skies, morning mists, barren trees or Gothic ruins. His primary interest as an artist was the contemplation of nature, and his often symbolic and anti-classical work seeks to convey a subjective, emotional response to the natural world. Friedrich's paintings characteristically set a human presence in diminished perspective amid expansive landscapes, reducing the figures to a scale that, according to the art historian Christopher John Murray, directs "the viewer's gaze towards their metaphysical dimension".

Friedrich was born in Pomerania, where he began to study art. He studied in Copenhagen until 1798, before settling in Dresden. A disillusionment with materialistic society was giving rise everywhere in Europe. This shift in ideals was often expressed through a reevaluation of the natural world, as artists such as Friedrich, J. M. W. Turner (1775–1851) and John Constable (1776–1837) sought to depict nature as a "divine creation, to be set against the artifice of human civilization".

Friedrich's work brought him renown early in his career, and contemporaries such as the French sculptor David d'Angers (1788–1856) spoke of him as a man who had discovered "the tragedy of landscape". Nevertheless, his work fell from favour during his later years, and he died in obscurity, and in the words of the art historian Philip B. Miller, "half mad". As Germany moved towards modernisation in the late 19th century, a new sense of urgency characterized its art, and Friedrich's contemplative depictions of stillness came to be seen as the products of a bygone age. The early 20th century brought a renewed appreciation of his work, beginning in 1906 with an exhibition of thirty-two of his paintings and sculptures in Berlin. By the 1920s his paintings had been discovered by the Expressionists, and in the 1930s and early 1940s Surrealists and Existentialists frequently drew ideas from his work. The rise of Nazism in the early 1930s again saw a resurgence in Friedrich's popularity, but this was followed by a sharp decline as his paintings were, by association with the Nazi movement, interpreted as having a nationalistic aspect.  It was not until the late 1970s that Friedrich regained his reputation as an icon of the German Romantic movement and a painter of international importance.

Friedrich was a prolific artist who produced more than 500 attributed works. In line with the Romantic ideals of his time, he intended his paintings to function as pure aesthetic statements, so he was cautious that the titles given to his work were not overly descriptive or evocative. It is likely that some of today's more literal titles, such as The Stages of Life, were not given by the artist himself, but were instead adopted during one of the revivals of interest in Friedrich. Complications arise when dating Friedrich's work, in part because he often did not directly name or date his canvases. He kept a carefully detailed notebook on his output, however, which has been used by scholars to tie paintings to their completion dates.

THE SCHAFREUTER PAINTED BY ALBERT FURTWÄNGLER

ALBERT FURTWÄNGLER (1902-1984) 

The Schafreuter (2, 102m- 6,896 ft) 

Germany - Austria border

The Mountain
The Schafreuter (2, 102m- 6,896 ft) also called Schafreuter or Scharfreiterring,  which means Sheep Shepherd is located in the Karwendel Mountains Range, on the border between Bavaria and Tyrol passes (according to a 1844 benchmark).  It is one of the 125 peaks in the Karwendel range  that reach heights of over 2,000 m, the highest being the Birkkarspitze  (2,749 m- 9,019 ft).
The  Schafreuter summit offers an excellent view of the Hinterautal-Vomper, chain and Karwendel North Soierngruppe in Karwendel and the most famous mountains of the Alps (Benediktenwand, Ross and Buchstein). The summit can be reach either from 1580 m by a grassy ridge, either from the Tölzer hut to 1835 m.
The Karwendel is the largest mountain range of the Northern Limestone Alps. The major part belongs to the Austrian federal state of Tyrol, while the adjacent area in the north is part of Bavaria, Germany. Four chains stretch from west to east; in addition, there are a number of fringe ranges and an extensive promontory  in the north. The term Karwendel describes the part of the Alps between the Isar river and the Seefeld Saddle mountain pass in the west and Achen Lake in the east. In the north it stretches to the Bavarian Prealps. In the south the Lower Inn Valley with the city of Innsbruck separates the Karwendel from the Central Eastern Alps. Other major settlements include Seefeld in Tirol and Mittenwald in the west, as well as Eben am Achensee in the east.

Neighbouring ranges are the Wetterstein and Mieming Mountains in the west and the Brandenberg Alps in the east.

The mountaineer Hermann von Barth created the tradition of naming the Karwendel chains ranges after the valleys limiting them in the south: Karwendel valley, Hinterau valley and Vomper Loch, Gleirsch valley, Hall valley, and Inn valley:

- Northern Karwendel Chain 

- Hinterautal-Vomper Chain (a.k.a. main Karwendel Range)

- Gleirsch-Halltal Chain

- Nordkette (a.k.a. Solstein Range or Inn Valley Range).

Réference : 

- Schafreuter in Karwendel website 

The painter 

Albert Furtwängler (1902-1984) is an german artist born in 1902.  He painted  mountain lansdcapes of the Tyrol aera and Black Forest.  His paintings are not very present in public auctions around the world. The oldest artwork ever registered by Artprice for this artist is a painting sold in 1995, at Auktionshaus Kaupp GmbH, and the most recent artwork is a painting sold in 2016. 

DIE ZUGSPITZE PAINTED BY MAX WOLFINGER

MAX  WOLFINGER (1837-1913)

The Zugspitze (2, 962 m- 9, 718 ft) 

Germany

The mountain 
The Zugspitze (2,962m -9,718 ft) above sea level, is the highest peak of the Wetterstein Mountains as well as the highest mountain in Germany. It lies south of the town of Garmisch-Partenkirchen, and the border between Germany and Austria runs over its western summit. South of the mountain is the Zugspitzplatt, a high karst plateau with numerous caves. On the flanks of the Zugspitze are three glaciers, including the two largest in Germany: the Northern Schneeferner with an area of 30.7 hectares and the Höllentalferner with an area of 24.7 hectares. The third is the Southern Schneeferner which covers 8.4 hectares.
The Zugspitze was first climbed on 27 August 1820 by Josef Naus, his survey assistant, Maier, and mountain guide, Johann Georg Tauschl. Today there are three normal routes to the summit: one from the Höllental valley to the northeast; another out of the Reintal valley to the southeast; and the third from the west over the Austrian Cirque (Österreichische Schneekar). One of the best known ridge routes in the Eastern Alps runs along the knife-edged Jubilee Ridge (Jubiläumsgrat) to the summit, linking the Zugspitze, the Hochblassen and the Alpspitze. For mountaineers there is plenty of nearby accommodation. On the western summit of the Zugspitze itself is the Münchner Haus and on the western slopes is the Wiener-Neustädter Hut.
Three cable cars run to the top of the Zugspitze. The first, the Tyrolean Zugspitze Cable Car, was built in 1926 and terminated on an arête below the summit before the terminus was moved to the actual summit in 1991. A rack railway, the Bavarian Zugspitze Railway, runs inside the northern flank of the mountain and ends on the Zugspitzplatt, from where a second cable car takes passengers to the top. The rack railway and the Eibsee Cable Car, the third cableway, transport an average of 500,000 people to the summit each year. In winter, nine ski lifts cover the ski area on the Zugspitzplatt. The weather station, opened in 1900, and the research station in the Schneefernerhaus are mainly used to conduct climate research.
Climbing
At the Zugspitze's summit is the Münchner Haus, a mountain hut (Alpenhütte), a facility built by the German Alpine Club (Deutscher Alpenverein). For more than a hundred years, the summit has also had a weather station, which nowadays also gathers data for the Global Atmosphere Watch.
Climbing up the Zugspitze can involve several routes. The large difference in elevation between Garmisch-Partenkirchen and the summit is 2,200 m (7,200 ft), making the climb a challenge even for trained mountaineers.
On the German side, from Garmisch-Partenkirchen, climbers go either through the Höllental ("Valley of Hell") or the Reintal. The way through the Reintal is the easiest, but also the longest and takes 8 to 10 hours. This path goes through the Partnachklamm, a scenic gorge, then through the Reintal up to the Zugspitzplatt, a barren plateau. from there up to the summit. Climbers can stay for the night at two alpine huts, the "Reintalangerhütte" or the "Knorrhütte".
The more popular, but harder route is through the Höllental. It starts at Hammersbach near Garmisch, goes through the Höllentalklamm, a similar gorge up to the "Höllentalangerhütte", where one can take a meal or stay for the night. It then crosses the Höllentalferner, the remnants of a small glacier. After that it traverses a wall with the help of iron ladders and steps. Klettersteig equipment is recommended for that part. Over the Irmerscharte (a gap) it reaches the summit. This path will take 7 to 8 hours.
From the Austrian village of Ehrwald, there are also two variants. One goes straight through the Western Flank, which is the shortest route overall, but rather hard. It includes a via ferrata, and there is a hut called "Wiener Neustädter Hütte" by the Austrian Alpine Club. An easier path leads via the Ehrwalder Alm, across a small pass called "Gatterl", joining the Reintal path at the Knorrhütte.


The Painter 
Max Wolfinger was a german painter and teacher at several Aargau middle schools and curator.
After Wolfinger had graduated from the school in Mannheim, he attended the High School in his hometown. Then he trained in the studio of painter Willhelm Dünke. Later Wolfinger joined  the painting classes of Grand Ducal Gemäldegalerie in Mannheim. After two years of study in Berlin and Dresden from 1857 to 1859, he moved to Munich. There, Wolfinger devoted himself to landscape painting. His paintings are  typical features of the Munich landscape painting in the second half of the 19th century. His work "Park in Königsfelden" is located in the Aargau art collection and two landscapes "Studies from Bavaria" have the city of Aarau and the Aargauische district school.